A typical illumination module includes at least a light-emitting component and often an optical assembly together being operable to generate an illumination. Often, the illumination can be a patterned illumination. A patterned illumination can include a regularly repeating unit cell, for example. A patterned illumination can be used, in conjunction with other optoelectronic modules, to generate three-dimensional (3D) data. For example, a patterned illumination can be exploited in an active stereo system for generating 3D data. In other examples, a patterned illumination can be exploited in a structured-light or encoded-light system for generating 3D data.
An encoded-light system can make use of a patterned illumination (e.g., a collection of high-intensity features) with minimal ambiguity. A patterned illumination composed of evenly spaced and uniform features, such as a grid pattern of identical dots, may exhibit significant ambiguity and may significantly complicate efforts to generate 3D data from such a patterned illumination. However, a patterned illumination that exhibits minimal ambiguity (e.g., a sporadic or random, arrangement of high-intensity features, or an arrangement exhibiting at least some irregularity) can be effective, at minimum, in reducing the amount of computational resources required to generate 3D data from a patterned illumination.
A typical illumination module includes an array of light sources and an optical assembly, such as a microlens array. Such a module typically produces a patterned illumination that exhibits significant ambiguity, though the module has many advantages (e.g., the efficiency, or optical power exhibited by such a module may be particularly high). Consequently, a challenge exists to produce modules that include an array of light sources and an optical assembly, but also generates patterned illuminations having minimal ambiguity.